


Tenderfoot

by petrovasfire



Category: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: F/M, Fluff, Missing Scene
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-04-21
Updated: 2014-04-21
Packaged: 2018-01-20 07:01:17
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,031
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1501148
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/petrovasfire/pseuds/petrovasfire
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>They kiss, and then go for coffee.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Tenderfoot

The kiss takes them both by surprise.

As Regina tugs on his collar, more desperate to shut him up—to make him stop _apologising_ already—than to actually kiss him, Robin lurches forward and their lips ineluctably fall together. She feels his body tense up at first, but she only delves further into the kiss.

And then it happens.

Images, fabricating themselves into every corner of her mind like the splintered pieces of a lost memory. A gloved hand reaching for hers, and then _M_ _’lady, you’re injured_ followed by _It’s Your Majesty, and I’m fine_. The exchange of relieved smiles when a flying monkey swoops in after a little boy and fails. Herself, concocting a sleeping curse while he soothes her out of it.

Regina staggers back and takes in a sharp breath. So they _had_ met before. And they'd done more than simply meet; they’d connected. She’d let him in enough for him to have witnessed the less brash side of her. He’d disclosed the story of his late wife just as she’d had of her son, and they had learned more about each other with each furtive footstep into her castle.

When she meets Robin’s eyes, she realises he’s wearing the same stunned look on his face, and she knows he feels the same tingling brush fire on his lips as she does on hers. They regard each other with an expression that’s borne out of relief—to have found each other again at last, to have disentangled the conundrum of their easygoing relationship.

They don’t speak for the longest time. They don’t speak at all.

Without any more hesitation, Robin shifts his body closer to Regina’s and presses his lips firmly against hers. The same satisfying feeling washes over them both. He sweeps his thumb fleetingly across her jaw as he grins into the kiss. Regina leans forward then, and Robin curves an arm around her back, pulling her so close to him their overcoats scrape over one another. When they pull away, the deep crimson patched over her fair skin makes him laugh.

“Coffee?” Robin blurts, slipping his hand easily into hers, and Regina has to laugh because it's an entirely arbitrary thing to say.

“Coffee,” she agrees.

* * *

It had been a long and tiring day, both physically and emotionally. Perhaps even mentally, if having to stop her dead mother from possessing her has-been archenemy could be considered mental. She decides that it could.

Instead of sitting across from her, Robin sidles into the seat in her side of the booth and pushes a piping hot cup of espresso towards her. She eyes it intently before swiping at the air above it in a swift, abrupt movement. Immediately, the light smoke emanating from it disappears and Regina takes a long sip.

“Warm and nice,” she explains to a gaping Robin.

He shakes his head with a smile. “You work wonders, Your Majesty.”

Though Regina would normally incline at his allusion to her royal epithet, tonight she feels her face heat up at it. Robin inches closer towards her and their shoulders touch. He splays his arm out across the table, and Regina’s gaze trails towards the lion tattoo. Her gaze always trails back to the lion tattoo every time it comes into view.

“You’re staring at my tattoo again,” he notes accusingly. “You know, I’m starting to feel slightly insecure about it.”

“Don’t,” she says quietly, “it’s a good sign.”

“Oh, really?” He’s twinkling at her. “Well then, would you care to decipher it for me?”

“Just don’t take this the wrong way," Regina says, and her mouth becomes a waterfall. "A fairy once told me—and well, she kind of lost her wings after that, so you wouldn’t want to believe anything she’s got to say—that I’d run into a man with a lion tattoo. And he’s supposed to bring me something…” she takes a deep breath, "something I haven’t had in a very long time.”

“And what’s that?”

Regina darts a glance across the table. She’s already regretting telling him that her constant habit of staring at his tattoo meant something good, let alone having to blurt out Tinker Bell’s demented conception about how they’re each other’s true love and that their story has probably been written in the stars before they’d even met. She casts down her eyes down, and they rest upon her coffee.

“It’s all right, Regina.” Robin flickers his thumb across her cheek. “You don’t have to tell me about it right now.”

He’s being kind and generous and all sorts of nice again, for the umpteenth time this week—since she’d assigned the task of keeping her heart to him, then him vowing to retrieve it now that it’s lost—and now he’s giving Regina all the time in the world to admit something that she’s still struggling to understand herself. She bites her lip nimbly and then turns to look at him, already wishing she could swallow back the words before even uttering them.

“It’s love,” Regina says, her voice barely audible. “He’s supposed to bring me… love.”

Robin opens his mouth to speak, but then he closes it again. The silence spins out longer than she hopes it to, and Regina wishes nothing more than to be abducted by one of Zelena’s flying monkeys.

“Look, forget I said anything,” she finally says, her voice faltering. “Like I said before, I don’t want you to take it the wrong way, so let’s forget about all of that nonsense and simply focus on—”

Her words get cut off, because the next moment her mouth is on Robin’s. Or rather, Robin’s mouth is on hers. His fingers curl around her neck as he dives more profoundly into the kiss, and her thoughts drown instantly. His lips graze over her jaw, and their noses nudge one another. They pull away and Regina is left breathless and confused.

“Regina,” he murmurs, breathing each syllable of her name with all the tenderness in the world. “Why would I take it the wrong way? Why would I take it any other way at all?”

And then he pulls her in for another kiss.


End file.
